Cassara Wins Venice Mens Foil GP – Meinhardt Silver

Andrea Cassara (ITA) held onto his top world ranking in men’s foil with a 15-8 victory in Venice over US fencer Gerek Meinhardt. The two fencers topped a field of 126 entries in the Grand Prix event which continued the story line of Italy’s hold in foil and the US team’s emergence as a top power.

The US now has 3 fencers in the top-16: Alex Massialas (5th), Race Imboden (11th), and Meinhardt (12th). Miles Chamley-Watson sits at 17th.

Gerek Meinhardt has made 3 straight top-8 finishes pushing him up to 12th in the FIE world rankings.

The US fencers all ended up in the top half of the elimination bracket, setting up a top-8 match between Meinhardt and Miles Chamley-Watson. Meinhardt took the match 15-13 and moved on to the semi-finals against Peter Joppich (GER). Meinhardt advanced to the finals with a decisive 15-10 victory over the multi-time world champion to set up a final match with Cassara.

On the other side of the 8, Cassara defeated Artem Sedov (RUS) 15-5 then faced off against teammate Andrea Baldini (ITA). Cassara emerged victorious 15-13 to advance and meet Meinhardt.